Somewhere Out There
by thejennamonster
Summary: UPDATED! Sequel to You Only Live Twice. It wasn't even their war to fight, so what did it matter whether they lived or died?
1. Prologue

Somewhere Out There.

by: Thejennamonster.

PROLOGUE: Defying gravity.

_"You're back."_

_"Finally."_

_"It has been a long time, hasn't it?"_

_"...Yeah. For a while there...nevermind. It doesn't matter, anymore."_

_"I...I always did believe you. Somehow, I always knew you were telling the truth."_

_"I know."_

_"I'm glad you're home."_

_"Me, too."_

I woke up, startled to find myself in the cramped bunk space that I had been inhabiting for the past seven months. Half formed voices and images danced in the space in the back of my mind before disappearing entirely, making me wonder what it was that had jerked me out of sleep so suddenly. Whatever it was, it left me with a feeling if loss so intense that I could barely breath. There was just something so...vivid, so real about the dream that...

"You do realize it's four in the morning, right?" asked a muffled, grumpy voice from across the room, cutting into my internal monologue. Squinting, I could make out the shadowy form of my sister holding a pillow over her head.

"Is it?" I asked, running a hand though my hair.

"Yes. Yes it is. So if you don't mind, _please_ stop talking to yourself and go back to sleep, or I _will_ be forced to shove this pillow down your throat."

Whoops. Guess my monologue hadn't been entirely internal. Still needed to work on that. At this point in our lives, Gaz's threats were more talk than action, but it still probably wasn't the best idea to provoke her at four in the morning. On the other hand…

"Come on, Gaz, like you're _really_ going to get up and come all the way over here just to suffocate me. By the time you did that you'd be more awake than you already are, and would never go back to sleep, which would completely defeat the purpose."

"Don't try to use your warped boy logic on me, Dib. I can, and I _will_ destroy you if you don't shut up and go back to sleep."

Part of me wanted to aggravate my sister a little more, just for the hell of it. But then, that part of me had never been very smart. I decided to ignore it.

"Fine," I sighed, lying back down. I squirmed around, nuzzling my face into my pillow in an attempt to find a comfortable position in such minimal space. Gaz and I had been in space only a few weeks before I realized that all of the legends about "Little Green Men" weren't exaggerating in the least. While Zim was considered "short" for his species, the rest of the universe's inhabitants weren't much better. The average universal height was five foot three, which suited Gaz fine being as she was five foot nothing with shoes on. Myself, however, at a lanky five eleven, was pretty much doomed to being shoved into uncomfortably small living spaces for the majority of our stay amongst the stars.

I curled my knees up to my chest in an awkward fetal position and wrapped my arms around my legs. Sighing again, I flipped my entire body onto my other side, holding myself tighter, hoping that the instinctual comforting position might do something to alleviate my discomfort. It didn't work. Sighing for a record third time in three point five seconds I flipped back over onto my back and stretched the length of the bunk, allowing my calves and feet to hang over the end. I gave up. There was no use. I would never sleep comfortably again.

I allowed my mind to wander for a little while, concentrating again on the dream that had awakened me. I had been talking to someone, that much I was sure of, but whom? And about what? I remembered there was this…feeling of utter familiarity and relief, but I had no recollection what from. Try as I might, the images refused to come of my feeble and sleep deprived mind and, like a good nights rest, I decided just to give up and focus on something else.

This, however, proved to be boring.

"Gaz?"

"What." came her muffled reply. She still had the pillow over her head.

"You asleep?"

"Obviously not anymore or I wouldn't have answered, now would I have."

Oh. Right.

"Do you think that Dad misses us?"

She sighed. I could hear the sound of cloth moving against cloth as she sat up in her bunk.

"Yes, Dib. I'm sure he's holding a picture of the two of us right now, sobbing over it, waiting and hoping that tonight will be the night that we arrive home. Give me a break, he probably hasn't even realized that we're gone. And if he has, he's only worried that he'll no longer receive the publicity he got from 'raising' two kids as a single father."

She was right. I knew it just as well as she—the events from the year prior—the year of my accident—were proof enough of that.

"Besides, what do you care? I thought you didn't give a damn about what he thought, considering…" She trailed off.

"I don't, really, it's just…do you think anyone misses us? Do you think that anyone really _cares_ that we're not around anymore? Do you think that anyone will, you know, be excited when we come home?"

"_If_ we come home, you mean," she corrected.

"What an optimistic view you have, Gaz, as always." I commented. I sighed. Again. I really needed to find another way to express my frustration. All this sighing was becoming annoying.

"Come one, Dib, we've been out here for how many months now?"

"Seven."

"Right. And are we even _near_ accomplishing what we came out here to do?"

She was right. I knew it. But I was never one to admit defeat.

"That doesn't mean anything. The Empire could fall at any moment—"

"Sure it could. And I could grow a pair of wings and Riverdance, that doesn't mean—"

"Wait a second," I interrupted, not being about to get over the mental image she had just put into my head, "what do growing wings and Riverdancing have to do with each other? Can you even Riverdance while flying? That kind of defeats the entire—"

"I was hyperbole, Dib. I was exaggerating to make a point, it doesn't have to—"

"Actually I don't think that that counts as a hyperbole. No that definitely isn't the right--"

"Fine," my sister interrupted, " I was being…damn it, what's that stupid word… facetious. That's it. I was being facetious. Now will you shut up and go to sleep? Seriously."

I sighed, again, "Yeah, sure. Sorry."

"Whatever," my sister replied. I could hear her lying back down, and pulling the covers back over herself.

I stared at the ceiling a few moments, trying to bore myself into sleep. Failing, I decided to go another route.

"Hey, Gaz?"

"ARG!" I heard a guttural, primal growl from the other side of the room, followed by a white, square object flying through the air to hit me directly in the forehead. I chuckled to myself as I heard Gaz pull her blankets over her head, grumbling to herself. Tucking the pillow she had just chucked at me under my head, nuzzling into it's soft cushiness. The added elevation was just what was needed to counteract the discomfort of sleeping in a bed that was six inches too short.

I wondered why I hadn't though of that, before.

I finally drifted back off into a restful sleep. Little did I know that it was the last that I would have for a very long time to come.

--

A/N: And hello again all you out there in TV land. This is the (dun dun dun ) sequel to "You Only Live Twice" which, as those of you who read the last story might have guessed, is pretty much going to be "Invader Dib". Hopefully this will work out. I have a hazy picture in my head as to what is going to occur, but the voices are only whispering at this point, so I cannot be too sure as to how it is all going to work. The only clue that I'll give you (which really is the only clue I have myself) is the lyrics to "Somewhere Out There" by Our Lady Peace (hence the title). That's all I can tell you.

So, the question might be: "Sequel? You're telling me that I have to read another freaking story before I get this one?" The answer, my friends, is "No." While there will be some allusions to the past fic (a few have been made, already), and one or two familiar faces may poke their noses into this all, you won't Really have to read the other fic in order to understand what's going on. This is a separate and new adventure for our cast, so don't worry about all that. However, if you want to read YOLT, I'm not going to stop you. At all. (grin).

As far as updates are concerned, I'm going to attempt at once a week. However, I, at the moment, work almost 60 hours a week at the restaurant my family has just opened, and also have an original project that I'm working on, so if I don't hit my deadline, you'll have to forgive me.

At any rate, I'm going to shut up, now. Please R and R. It makes me feel all warm and squishy in spite of the three inches of snow that has made itself home on my front porch.


	2. Part One

DISCLAIMER (because I forgot on the last chapter. Whoops): I don't own Zim. Last I checked, anyhow. Things could have changed in between then and now…

Somewhere Out There.

By: Thejennamonster.

PART ONE: So you call this a party?

Once upon a time, there was a boy named Dib. Now, Dib was an all around average, normal little boy, except for one minor detail: he could see things that others wouldn't. There is a big difference, you see, between things that people Can't see, and things that people Won't. If one were to see things that other people can't: atoms and molecules, dust mites, and viruses, if one were to see _those_, that person would be classified as a Scientific Miracle. They would be on magazine covers and in newspapers, the media screaming "Amazing Child Can See Cancer Cells! Blood Tests No Longer Needed!" Talk shows, movie deals, radio spots, clothing lines, the American public wouldn't be able to get enough of this wondrous child, this miracle child, this god.

Hover, when it comes to seeing things that people Won't; things that cause their hearts to race and their skin to crawl, things that defy all scientific explanation: ghosts and aliens and Big Feet using belt sanders—when it comes to those, the world has one word: Crazy. Our small, average little boy had been declared this horrible, hideous word more times than he could count. By the age of ten, he had been institutionalized twenty seven separate times. The world at large Wouldn't see these things that our boy could for a reason: the world at large feared what it did not understand. And since the world didn't understand our boy, Dib, he was ridiculed, ostracized, beat up and otherwise humiliated all because the world didn't understand the boy who could see that the emperor wore no clothes.

And so, once upon a time, this average little boy was lonely. And once upon a time, he made a wish: a wish that he could have Proof of what he saw. That he could have Proof, and with that, the vindication and recognition he deserved.

And then, one day, one fateful, life changing day, our small, average, lonely little boy…met Zim.

_oooIIIooo_

"There! There, I see her! She's right there, under us, Zim! You found the right vent! I knew you could do it! You're so smart, Zim! You—"

"_QUIET!_" Hissed a very irritated Zim as he lunged forward in the cramped vent space to slap a gloved hand over his cohort's mouth. He was becoming more and more aware of how accidental it must have been that Scoodge was the first of the Invaders in Operation Impending Doom Two to complete his assignment, being that the squat Irken was nothing more than a very eager, very determined, little fool. This, he knew, was the exact reason why the Tallests had sent him along with Zim on the obviously suicidal mission to rescue Invader Tenn from Meekrob's highly guarded maximum security POW prison. They were hoping, as it were, to kill two nuisances with one assignment. So far, as they crawled though the rat infested sewers of the prison's underbelly and cramped themselves into too-small ventilation space, Zim was certain that the Tallests' plan was going to work, because it was becoming more and more obvious the he would be forced to strangle his partner out of sheer annoyance and then be stuck behind his fat, rotting carcass for the rest of eternity. If he had to hear about how Scoodge conquered Blortch one. more. time…

This was all, of course, before they saw The Sign. The finding of The Sign was all together accidental (as all great discoveries in the face of great danger are). The two had been on their tenth hour crawling through the ventilation system of floor 134 section alpha when they heard a horrible sound. The sound…of bending metal. That sound could only mean one thing: that the section of shaft they were in was about to collapse. They froze, not wanting to put any more stress on the weakened metal than they had to, and discussed their options:

Scoodge thought that it would be wise to slowly shimmy backwards until they reached the last "T" in the vent they had come to and attempt a different route.

Zim thought that maybe Scoodge shouldn't have eaten that extra jumbo sized Meekrobian burrito that they had found in the dining hall area ten floors down but it was a little late to think about _that_, now, wasn't it?

While they debated (or insulted, however you would like to look at it), the shaft they were in decided for them, and crashed to the ground, leaving the two bumbling Irkens on a tangled, moaning heap on the floor of the corridor below.

Quickly regaining their composure, the two frantically scanned the corridor for another way into the shaft (or some other viable escape route) before the Meekrob guards arrived to investigate the strange sound. And that was when they saw it.

Now, most people, when confronted with a giant, neon sign stating "There's no captured Irken spy this way!" complete with a rather large, glowing arrow pointing in said direction, would be at least the slightest bit suspicious that maybe, just maybe, it was a trap. But not these brave Irkens. These Irkens saw it was The Sign They Were Looking For, and, without a second thought, rushed down the corridor the arrow was pointing, scrambled back into the ventilation system, and shimmied their way to rescue their captured comrade.

And that brings right back to where we started (don't you just love it when that happens?).

"_QUIET!_" Hissed a very irritated Zim as he lunged forward in the cramped vent space to slap a gloved hand over his cohort's mouth, "Do not make another sound! I have to think. There has to be a way down into that room without the guards noticing us."

He removed his hand from Scoodge's mouth (and resisted the urge to replace it around his fat, annoying, overachieving throat), and surveyed the room below from their vantage point in the vent shaft. Tenn was tied to a post in the very center of the room, seemingly unconscious. Two guards were strategically placed in front of their prisoner, their attention focused on the door to the room.

"It's quiet." Scoodge whispered, ignoring Zim's order to stay silent.

"Yeah," Zim answered, absently, as he was still focuses on coming up with a plan, "too quiet…all right, here's what we do…" He leaned a little closer to his partner and whispered the plan so that only he could hear it because that's just how it works out in these things.

After a few moments of rudely whispering so that no one else could hear them, knowing that it's impolite to keep secrets from people, Scoodge finally nodded in understanding, and set to work. Quietly removing a panel from the bottom of the vent, and using his spider legs for support, he silently lowered himself to the floor behind the two guards. Retracting the legs from the vent shaft, he moved the front two until they were poised to strike above the guards' heads and, easy as pie, shot two twin lasers directly into the guard's heads.

Watching from above, and seeing that the coast was now clear, Zim jumped down from his hiding place in the vent and joined his partner in the small prison room.

"Well," Scoodge commented, slapping his hands together, "that was easy."

"Yeah," answered Zim warily, "a little too easy."

They both turned to face their imprisoned peer.

"We've almost completed our mission, Scoodge. There's Tenn—"

"Yeah," Scoodge interrupted, "a little _too_ Tenn."

Zim stared at him for a moment. "I hate you."

"Sorry."

By this time, Tenn, who had been awakened by the sound of her falling guards, had noticed her two rescuers and was shouting wildly from behind the tape that covered her mouth. It was almost as if she were trying to tell them something, perhaps trying to warn them…however, our heroes were not to be distracted by such hysteria from a female. She was obviously just overjoyed at finally being rescued! And by such handsome knights, too.

"Fear not!" Zim exclaimed, tearing the tape from Tenn's lips, "You are freed! The Almighty Tallests have—"

"You idiots!" Tenn interrupted, "It's a trap!"

Zim and Scoodge took a final moment to look at each other in horror before all hell broke loose.

_oooIIIooo_

Gaz hated space. Gaz hated a lot of things, being as she was an incredibly angsty fifteen year old girl, but more than anything else, she decided, she hated space. When she had suggested all those months ago that she and Dib go with Zim on his new mission to save Irk from their enemy, the planet Meekrob, she thought that it would be a relatively short journey. She had been on space adventures before—most of them to rescue her stupid brother from some equally stupid predicament he had gotten himself into in Zim's space station—and they had lasted one, maybe two hours, tops. Now, she wasn't naive enough to think that winning a war (or rather, sabotaging one) would only take them a matter of days, but she definitely hadn't counted on it taking almost a year with there still not being any end in sight. Had she thought of this before, she would have brought more batteries for her GS2.

It actually probably wouldn't have been that bad if they had seen any action so far on their adventure, but so far, things were pretty, well, action-less. It had taken them six whole months cramped in Tak's modified ship (thy had followed Zim, who rode in his own Voot Runner) to get from Earth to this rinky-dink little space port right outside the Irken/ Meekrob neutral (or, well, not so neutral) zone, and another two weeks to find how to contact the resistance faction known only as The Resisty (a name which Gaz thought could have used a few more brainstorming sessions), who were the ones who had started the stupid war in the first place. In the mean time, Zim had disappeared on his mission from his Tallests (the idiots) to rescue some chick, leaving her and her brother alone on the station. He assured them that he would be in touch, but it has been two days with no word from the green menace and, against her better judgment, Gaz was beginning to become worried. Not that she would admit it, of course.

"This is so STUPID, Gaz!" her brother stated from across the room, echoing her own internal sentiments as he threw down the "Space Invasion for Dummies" book he had been reading, "Zim is out there having all the adventure and we're stuck in _here_ doing nothing! This sucks!"

"Will you relax," Gaz began in an attempt to calm her older brother down, if only because his voice sometimes caused her to become irrationally angry and she was trying to be nice to him ever since…well she was just trying to be nice, "the contact should be here any moment to take us down to meet with the Resisty's leader. So calm down before you give yourself an aneurism."

Dib took a deep breath and ran a hand through his hair, "Yeah, sorry, I just--"

"You're not used to having to be the one who sits and waits, I know," his sister interrupted, "I know. But you're just going to have to get used to it. We're out of our element, here, Dib. We're god knows how many light years from Earth, where we don't speak the language or eat the food and who knows what the water's been doing to our systems. We're stuck here, but we don't really have a choice, now, so we might as well both just get used to it and deal with the details before focusing on the big picture."

Dib looked at her, a bit startled, "Wow. Since when were you the calm and collected voice of reason?"

Gaz shrugged, not meeting his gaze, "Since I'm the one who got us into this mess. And also since…forget it, never mind."

"Huh? What are you talking about?" Dib probed, walking over and leaning against the chair she was sitting in.

She shook her head, "Nothing. Just drop it, alright?"

"No, you started to say something. I'm not going to—"

He was interrupted by a high pitched chime programmed to inform them that someone was at the door. The siblings looked at each other a moment, before both standing and making their ways to the doorway of their room.

They exchanged another glance, before Dib commanded, "Enter."

The door slid open revealing one of the strangest creatures they had ever seen. It was small and green, like most of the aliens they had come in contact with, with stubby little limbs and large, bulging eyes. All this, however, wasn't the strange part. They strange part was that he appeared to be constantly vomiting a bright pink liquid all over itself and the floor surrounding it. Gaz could see a trail of the stuff leading back behind the way that it had come. She began to wonder the intelligence level of an organization that sent this creature to lead them to its "secret base".

"Excuse me, but have you seen the squelints this year?" the creature asked, spilling more of the pink liquid into the doorway. Gaz recognized the code phrase that they had been told to listen for (Zim had implanted a small translating device in each of their ears before leaving Earth), but couldn't bring herself to state the reply. The sight (and smell) of the creature was making her a bit queasy and she was afraid that if she opened her mouth, her lunch (which she was fairly certain hadn't been all that edible anyway) would come back out to say hello.

Dib, however, was able to recover himself quickly enough to not arouse suspicion, and answered, "But I thought the squelints weren't native to this area."

The small creature nodded slightly, and recited another phrase of the agreed code, "They aren't but I know where we can find some."

Dib smiled, attempting to seem more comfortable with the situation than he actually was, and said the final phrase, "Well then, by all means, take us there! I'm sure the trip will be lovely."

The creature nodded again, and then turned back the way it came, obviously expecting them to follow. Dib took a deep breath, and motioned for Gaz to go first before following her out of the room, allowing the doors to slide shut behind them.

They walked in silence a few moments, trying hard to maneuver around the numerous puddles of pink liquid that lay in the corridor in front of them. The stuff had soaked into the yellow carpet, staining neon orange in places and causing a horrifying squishing noise that didn't help Gaz's growing nausea.

After a little while, as she knew he would, Dib broke in the awkward silence in an attempt to make small talk.

"So…do you have a name?" he asked, smiling as welcomingly as he could in spite of the fact that he could literally feel the acid from his stomach climbing back up his throat.

The creature only responded by spilling more pink liquid out into the hallway—and onto their shoes.

The rest of the walk continued in silence.

Finally, and not a moment too soon, they reached their destination. Their guide placed one stubby appendage against a panel on the door, which then slid open, revealing a darkened room. The creature motioned for the siblings to enter. Exchanging a worried glance, they obeyed.

The room was pitch black. Sensing a problem, here, Dib spun on his heels in an attempt to make a break for it out of the room. Before he could make it, however, the door slid shut, leaving them both in darkness.

"Great. Now what do we do?" Gaz asked, rhetorically.

She could feel her brother shrug beside her. Suddenly, without warning, there was a light. And then two, and then four, and six, and then it seemed a million filled the room. Eyes. In the darkness, Staring. Watching. Instinctively Gaz drew closer to her brother as he put an arm out to shield her from whom or whatever it was that surrounded them.

"Who-who are you?" He asked the darkness, "What do you want?"

And from the darkness he had his answer:

"We are the Resisty," a voice from beyond replied, "and you must prove yourselves worthy."

--

A/n: There you go, guys, the next part up right on schedule. Thank you for the wonderful reviews so far. It's nice to see some familiar faces who cheered me on during YOLT as well as some new ones. Thank you so much.

As you can see, this story is going to be written a little differently. As much as I loved being in Dib's head during YOLT, I found that first person perspective is incredibly limiting. This story has a much larger cast on a much larger scope and therefore we'll be jumping around quite a bit. Don't worry, though, we'll be back in Dib's head soon enough—probably the next chapter, actually. I just think it's nice to see what others are doing once in a while, ya know?

And of course there is a movie reference in this chapter (would it be one of my stories without one?) Whoever can guess it gets a cookie.

As always, please R and R and hopefully I can keep pumping these out once a week or so, no?

PS—if anyone can point me to a site that names all of the Resisty, I will be very thankful. I googled it while writing this chapter, but only found maybe three names, and none of them were for the vomiting guy. It made me sad.


	3. Part Two

A/n: Okay, so it has been a very, very long time since this story has updated. Almost three years to be exact. I honestly never thought that I would be continuing it. As strange as it may sound, my stories don't exactly come from me. I mean, they do, ultimately, but still—the characters decide they want their stories to be told. They tell me in their voices what they want to be said and usually will continue to nag my brain until I am unable to think of nothing else until what they want is down on paper. I am assured that this is quite normal amongst the writing community, though mentioning it still makes me think that someone is going to come after me with a white coat and take away my shoelaces. Ha.

But I digress.

2006, the year I stopped updating on this site, was both an amazing and terrible year for me. You see, in 2006 I got engaged to a boy that I had known in elementary school who I had reconnected with the year before after I moved back to my home town to help with a business my family was starting. And then, in October of that year, he died due to a congenital heart disease. I was devastated, and the voices stopped speaking. For the most part. I got a word here or there, but my own story, at that time, was far too painful for me to deal with, never the less worry about anyone else's. So I stopped writing. It took over a year to be able to complete a whole story. And, as much as I missed the fandom and wanted to finish these stories, the voices—at least these voices—just wouldn't come through.

Until today. Today, for some reason, I was sitting at work and the voices didn't speak—they Sang. They would not let these stories—or at least This story—go unfinished. It was going to get told, and damnit, it was going to get started Tonight!

And so here I am, continuing a story that I'm sure everything thought was long since dead, buried, and forgotten about. I can't guarantee how often I'll be updating—I both work and go to school full time as well as have been working on some original stories in an attempt to get Something published…and have acquired a rather unhealthy Warcraft addiction, ha —but I do guarantee that it will, eventually, be finished. I haven't been active on here for so long, I don't even know if any of my FFN "friends" are still around. I hope that they are. I miss them.

But this note has gone on long enough. I have a feeling most just scrolled past it, anyhow. So! On to the next chapter! I'm glad to see you all here. This is all going to be a wild ride.

PS--I did not tell the above story for sympathy, but simply to explain my long absence and hiatus of these stories. As much as I appreciate the sentiment, I have heard more "I'm sorry"s in the past two and a half years than I ever thought the hear in my life. So please, if you review, review the fic, not the a/n. Thank you.

-j

-

DISCLAIMER: As always, I don't own Zim. I do own the couple shades of characters that some may remember from YOLT, but anything else? Nope, not mine.

-

Somewhere Out There

By: thejennamonster

PART TWO: Meanwhile, Back On Earth…

-

"Hey, Braceface!" Zita's voice stabbed through me thoughts like an icicle. On habit, I ran my tongue over the front of my teeth. Smooth. Straight. I sighed, half in annoyance and half in some kind of subconscious relief. After so many years with a junkyard's worth of metal welded to my gums, there were days when I still felt that this blissful release was nothing more than a Nitrous Oxide hallucination while Dr. Stanley tightened the wires.

I continued my halfhearted dissection of whatever the cafeteria was calling food that day (it looked like it used to be a possum, suspicious tread-like marks marring its surface. Lunchlady Peters claimed they were "grill marks". I was not convinced) as Zita and her pets, Sarah and Jessica claimed the empty seats across from me. I glared at them through my bangs.

"Those seats are taken." I mumbled to the science project that was supposed to be my lunch.

"Are they?" Zita answered, wide eyed. She made a dramatic gesture of looking around the room before turning back to face me, "By who?"

"You _know_ who."

"Ah, yes. Dib," she answered, snapping as if just remembering something important, "So where is your boyfriend, anyhow?" She asked again, leaning her cheek against her palm. Her pets followed suit, perfect copies of whatever magazine Xerox Zita had decided to be that day.

I sighed, "You know I don't know the answer to that, Zita. You ask me almost daily. And he isn't my boyfriend." Which was true. He wasn't. Exactly. In all honesty, I couldn't tell what we really were. Our friendship had formed from the aftermath of potential tragedy, and I could never tell if he actually liked me or was just thankful that someone seemed to give a damn that he was in a coma for three months.

-

_It all started with a card. _

_I had found out about Dib's accident while working in the library over study hall as a TA, folding bluebook folders for the upcoming midterms, while Mrs. Ekhert and Ms. Bradley, the heads of English and Social Science, chattered away over their low-fat, sugar-free fresh fruit yogurt cups._

"_He's still unconscious?"_

"_It seems so. I feel bad for his sister, really. First her mother and now this. Professor Membrane is a genius, but raising children really doesn't seem to be his strong suit. That boy is all she has." _

_My ears perked up at the name Membrane. It had been no secret throughout the years that I harbored a small, unrequited crush on the world famous professor's son, Dib. Okay, maybe not that small, though I had come a long way from piling his desk full of (unnoticed) meat on Valentine's Day. He fascinated me. He kept insisting that the impossible existed—that these fantastical tales of aliens and Bigfoot and mutant killer hamsters were real—and I loved him for it. _

_And now…he was…_

"_I'm sorry," It wasn't like me to interrupt a teacher's conversation, but I had to know, "You're taking about Dib, right? He hasn't been in school for a while. Is…is he okay?" _

_The two teachers looked at each other, exchanging a glance that I had learned before my parents' divorce was adult speak for 'do we tell her or…'. _

_Mrs. Ekhert sighed, "There was a freak electrical accident. I'm afraid he's in a coma." _

_My world turned white. Coma? Did that mean—_

"_...Is he going to—"_

"_We don't know," Ms. Bradley continued for her colleague, cutting me off, "He's been unconscious for almost a month, though. It doesn't look good." _

_My entire body was cold; hands unable to control themselves as I suddenly forgot how to fold. "I…" My mouth moved on its own, though I found myself unable to speak. Something in my body must have been connecting, however, as I found my legs carrying me away from the teachers, out the double doors to the library, down the hall, across the parking lot pavement. The fifteen blocks to the hospital passed in a second and I nearly collapsed inside of the sliding glass door, heart pounding, sweat dripping. I watched myself walk up to the front desk, acquire the necessary room information and take the elevator to the fifth floor. _

_There was his room. _

_My senses returned in a rush, and I realized how foolish I was being. I had just walked out of school. In the middle of a conversation. With _teachers_. And ran halfway across town, for what? What was I doing here? Did I have some kind of soap opera fantasy that I could waltz in there, take his hand, whisper loving words, and he would open his eyes and see me as his savior? The woman to bring him back to the living? Was I really that pathetic? _

_Mentally chastising myself, I turned to leave, and ran face first into a doctor coming around the corner, causing him to drop the clipboard of papers he held in his hand, along with the blue test booklet that I hadn't realized I was still carrying. _

"_Oh my god, I am so sorry!" I apologized, instantly crouching to pick up the fallen papers. He bent over as well, gathering the documents. The petite nurse who had been walking beside him sighed and leaned against the wall, as if monitoring our progress. _

_The doctor chuckled, "Don't worry about it. It's perfectly okay."_

"_No, really, I'm—"_

"_Please," his hand was on my shoulder, causing me to look up for the first time from the spilled papers. His smile was warm, genuine, "don't apologize. There's no harm done." _

_We stood together, and he ran a hand over his bright red hair before seeming to realize something about the papers in his hand, "Oh. I think this one is yours."_

_He handed me back the blue test booklet. My face was a million degrees. "Uh, thanks."_

_He smiled again, "Were you going in to visit Dib?" _

_I hadn't realized that it was possible for my face to get any redder than it already was. "I, uh…no, no, I don't want to disturb him."_

_The nurse chuckled a bit under her breath, pushing her black rimmed glasses back up on her nose. The doctor shot her a look I couldn't exactly read. She raised her hands in apology, but I noticed out of the corner of my eye that, once he turned back towards me, she stuck her tongue out in his direction. _

"_You wouldn't be disturbing him, really. It's good for him to have visitors."_

"_No, really…I should be going." I started to turn to leave before feeling his hand again on my shoulder._

"_Maybe leave the card then? So he knows that you were here when he wakes up?"_

"…_.When?" My heart was in my throat, pounding against my esophagus, begging to be let free. I turned back towards him, "So…so there's a chance? He's going to be—"_

"_There's always a chance," the nurse interrupted me from her spot against the wall, seeming to talk to the air in front of her as raised her arms above her head and arched her back in a stretch, "and Dib, well, he does seem to have a better chance than most." She relaxed, once again, against the wall, "This is the best progress we've seen from…someone in his condition…in a long time. He's got a strong will." She looked me in the eye for the first time, an almost wistful smile on her face, " He'll make it back to you." _

"_To…to me? No, I…we…we're not—"_

_She chuckled again under her breath. Another look from the doctor. She rolled her eyes. He sighed. _

"_So you're going to leave the card?" he asked, pointing to the folder in my hand. _

"_Oh! I…well this isn't really a…" I stopped myself, taking a breath, "Yes. Yes I will. Can I borrow your pen?"_

_The doctor smiled, handing it over. There was a demented looking stick figure painted on it. I was beginning to wonder about the staff of this hospital. _

_I scribbled a short "get well" message on the front, signing the inside. As an afterthought I made a PS about keeping copies of the homework for him so he didn't get too far behind when he woke up. I felt a smell jolt from my stomach as I wrote the words. _

_I handed both the pen and the 'card' back to the Doctor, who smiled, saying that he would make sure that Dib got it. I thanked him and the nurse before making my way out of the hospital._

_-  
_

_A little over two months later Dib showed up on my doorstep, my card in his hand. He wanted to know if my promise to help him catch up with the homework was still good. As I led him into my house, I felt that strange, yet familiar jolt. Things were going to be okay. _

_And then, a year later, well…._

_-  
_

"Then you shouldn't mind if we—" Zita was still talking, making herself comfortable in the chair across from me. The chair that he sat in every day at lunch before he left, Gaz beside him as Zim sat across from her, the boys shouting half true threats of world domination while Gaz and I rolled our eyes and talked videogames. Zita and her pets were in their seats. I could feel the heat rising from the back of my neck, a familiar clamp pressed against my chest.

"I _said_ those seats are _taken_!" For some reason, I was standing, my hands slamming into the table with enough force for my 'lunch' to clatter to the floor. The lunchroom grew eerily quiet. I could feel the stare of every pair of eyes in the room as my face grew hot, my blood rushing to the surface. Fantastic. As if people didn't think I was weird enough.

As with all things that draw a teenagers' attention, however, the moment quickly passed, as they grew bored and returned to their own little bubbles of the social strata. Zita stood, Sarah and Jessica quickly following suit. She shook her head, raising her fingers to massage the bridge of her nose as if she had a headache. The silver Tiffany's charm bracelet sparked in the dull lighting of the cafetorium.

"Look, Gretchen. I'm not trying to be a bitch, here. Honest. It's been over six months. Everyone knows that that him and Zim finally ended up killing each other, and Gaz went crazy with grief—"

"That's not what—" I started to protest, my hands tightening on the table. I could feel slivers of the unpainted wood starting to dig under my nails.

"It was in the paper, Gretchen," Sarah interrupted from behind Zita's shoulder.

"The _school_ paper," I retorted, "Which _you_ run. And poorly, I might add."

"Hey! That's not—" Sarah started to protest. Zita cut her off.

"The _point_ is," Zita continued, shooting a glare over her shoulder at Sarah, or seemed to visibly shrink a few inches, "that you're starting to seem as crazy as he was, insisting that he's coming back, that's he's off fighting some _war_ that—"

"But he—"

"—that could possibly doom the universe if the wrong planet wins," Zita finished talking over me.

"That. Is. What. Happened. Zita." Yep, there were definitely splinters under my fingernails. I could feel my fingers screaming an agony as I gripped the table tighter, but they didn't matter in that moment. They were nothing. They didn't even exist. "It may sound crazy, but—"

"Of _course_ it sounds crazy! Because it _is_, Gretchen! So you can either sit here and pick at your food and pretend that everything's okay and continue to be the laughing stock of the eleventh grade, or you can suck it up, grow a pair, and admit that _he's not coming back_! I'm even offering you help you do so. Monday, sit with us at lunch." Both Sarah and Jessica's heads jerked towards their leader, their faces identical masks of shock. Zita continued, unfettered, "Sit with us and we'll help you through this."

The adrenalin was starting to fade, the pulsing pain in my fingertips stabbing sharp needles up my arms. I released my grip on the table. "Why should I trust you?"

Zita shrugged, "You probably shouldn't. I don't expect you to, at least. But just think about it for now. We'll see you Monday."

That said, she turned, straightening her Gucci purse over her shoulder, and strutted towards the cafetorium door, her pets on tow. I allowed myself to relax, finally, sinking back into my seat. Though I didn't want to admit it, parts of what they said rang with a type of truth that I was trying desperately to ignore. While I knew that Dib and Zim had _not_ destroyed each other as the rest of the school thought, I hadn't heard anything from him since he showed up on my doorstep that night telling fantastic tales of intergalactic wars and space-based sabotage. He promised that he would find a way to contact me. To let me know he was safe. It had been more than six months, and I had yet to hear a word. I feared the worst.

But I wasn't about to let them see that.

Sighing, I reached down to pick up the remains of my scattered lunch, gasping as my fingertips shouted painful protests up my arms. The roadkill would have to wait.

I needed to go to the nurse.

-

A/n: Okay, I'm gonna end it there. This chapter was a bit more serious than those that came before, but I wanted to establish Gretchen as part of the story, as she'll play a rather large part later on. The next chapter will be rather…amusing at the least, hee.

So, if you're reading, drop a review and let me know. I'm curious to see if anyone from the old days are still around, and I'd love to hear from new people as well. :)


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